Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Follow-Up: Soundscapes On The Emacspeak Audio Desktop

1 Executive Summary

Nearly a year ago, I blogged here about Soundscapes on the emacspeak
Audio Desktop. That article ended with this following paragraph:

I implemented package soundscape to create a platform that would let me experiment
with different tools that aid in concentration. After using Soundscapes for about a week,
I have also found that it reduces some of the fatigue that results from having to listen
to synthetic text-to-speech for extended periods. The true value (if any) of this package
will be a function of how heavily I find myself using it six months from now --- as a
metric, complete success might mean that in mid-2016, I still have automatic soundscapes
turned on.

2 And Nearly A Year Later …

I have not found the need to turn off Soundscapes in Emacspeak. As
conjectured, it has definitely increased my productivity, specifically
in terms of staying focused on a given task at hand. Over the year,
I've also augmented the emacspeak Audio Desktop with support for
binaural audio — see module sox-gen — which provides a collection of
binaural themes for use during different times of the day. Binaural
themes generated by that module overlay Emacspeak Soundscapes to
provide an ideal auditory environment for use over headphones.

3 Soundscape Enhancements

Since the publication of the original article, Emacspeak Soundscapes
have been enhanced with additional sounds fromFreesound.org. Emacspeak Soundscapes have been updated to take
advantage of Boodler's limited abilities in the areas of spatial
positioning. I typically use Soundscapes with one of several virtual
ALSA devices that have been configured to apply different Ladspa
effects such as reverb or crossfeed depending on the ambient
environment where I am working — this significantly improves the
spatialization of soundscapes being played — see fileladspa-asoundrc. Finally, the mapping of Soundscapes to various Emacs
modes has also been tuned. — see table below.

1 Investors Note:

With several prominent tweeters expanding coverage of#emacspeak, NASDOG: ESPK has now been consistently trading over
the social net at levels close to that once attained by DogCom
high-fliers—and as of Nov 2016 is trading at levels close to
that achieved by once better known stocks in the tech sector.

2 What Is It?

Emacspeak is a fully functional audio desktop that provides complete
eyes-free access to all major 32 and 64 bit operating environments. By
seamlessly blending live access to all aspects of the Internet such as
Web-surfing, blogging, social computing and electronic messaging into
the audio desktop, Emacspeak enables speech access to local and remote
information with a consistent and well-integrated user interface. A
rich suite of task-oriented tools provides efficient speech-enabled
access to the evolving service-oriented social Internet cloud.

3 Major Enhancements:

Speech-enabled tide for typescript development. 🌊

Speech-enabled jade for Javascript WebApp development. ⺩

Improved slime support for Lisp programming. Λ

Support for rst-mode for editting ReST files.🖹

Version control info in modeline.⎔

Speech-enabled elisp-refs to aid in refactoring. ※

GPG integration including pinentry support. 🔐

ElScreen support for window-layout management. 🆜

Updated Librivox client for audio books. 🔊🕮

Updated sound themes. 🔉

Support for Emacs' visual-line-mode. 🎁

Speech-enabled Threes game. 🎮

Updated Google News support. 📰

Binaural audio support including several predefined binaural themes. ℗

4 Establishing Liberty, Equality And Freedom:

Never a toy system, Emacspeak is voluntarily bundled with all
major Linux distributions. Though designed to be modular,
distributors have freely chosen to bundle the fully integrated
system without any undue pressure—a documented success for
the integrated innovation embodied by Emacspeak. As the system
evolves, both upgrades and downgrades continue to be available at
the same zero-cost to all users. The integrity of the Emacspeak
codebase is ensured by the reliable and secure Linux platform
used to develop and distribute the software.

Extensive studies have shown that thanks to these features, users
consider Emacspeak to be absolutely priceless. Thanks to this
wide-spread user demand, the present version remains priceless
as ever—it is being made available at the same zero-cost as
previous releases.

At the same time, Emacspeak continues to innovate in the area of
eyes-free social interaction and carries forward the
well-established Open Source tradition of introducing user
interface features that eventually show up in luser environments.

On this theme, when once challenged by a proponent of a crash-prone
but well-marketed mousetrap with the assertion "Emacs is a system from
the 70's", the creator of Emacspeak evinced surprise at the unusual
candor manifest in the assertion that it would take popular
idiot-proven interfaces until the year 2070 to catch up to where the
Emacspeak audio desktop is today. Industry experts welcomed this
refreshing breath of Courage Certainty and Clarity (CCC) at a time
when users are reeling from the Fear Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD)
unleashed by complex software systems backed by even more convoluted
press releases.

5 Independent Test Results:

Independent test results have proven that unlike some modern (and
not so modern) software, Emacspeak can be safely uninstalled without
adversely affecting the continued performance of the computer. These
same tests also revealed that once uninstalled, the user stopped
functioning altogether. Speaking with Aster Labrador, the creator of
Emacspeak once pointed out that these results re-emphasize the
user-centric design of Emacspeak; "It is the user –and not the
computer– that stops functioning when Emacspeak is uninstalled!".

5.1 Note from Aster,Bubbles and Tilden:

UnDoctored Videos Inc. is looking for volunteers to star in a
video demonstrating such complete user failure.

6 Obtaining Emacspeak:

Emacspeak can be downloaded from GitHub –seehttps://github.com/tvraman/emacspeak you can visit Emacspeak on the
WWW at http://emacspeak.sf.net. You can subscribe to the emacspeak
mailing list — emacspeak@cs.vassar.edu — by sending mail to the
list request address emacspeak-request@cs.vassar.edu. The Emacspeak
Blog is a good source for news about recent enhancements and how to
use them.

The latest development snapshot of Emacspeak is always available via
Git from GitHub at Emacspeak GitHub .

7 History:

Emacspeak 45.0 (IdealDog) is named in recognition of Emacs'
excellent integration with various programming language
environments — thanks to this, Emacspeak is the IDE of choice
for eyes-free software engineering.

Emacspeak 44.0 continues the steady pace of innovation on the
audio desktop.

Emacspeak 43.0 brings even more end-user efficiency by leveraging the
ability to spatially place multiple audio streams to provide timely
auditory feedback.

Emacspeak 42.0 while moving to GitHub from Google Code continues to
innovate in the areas of auditory user interfaces and efficient,
light-weight Internet access.

Emacspeak 41.0 continues to improve
on the desire to provide not just equal, but superior access —
technology when correctly implemented can significantly enhance the
human ability.

Emacspeak 40.0 goes back to Web basics by enablingefficient access to large amounts of readable Web content.

Emacspeak 39.0 continues the Emacspeak tradition of increasing the breadth of
user tasks that are covered without introducing unnecessary
bloatware.

Emacspeak 38.0 is the latest in a series of award-winning
releases from Emacspeak Inc.

Emacspeak 37.0 continues the tradition of
delivering robust software as reflected by its code-name.

Emacspeak 36.0 enhances the audio desktop with many new tools including full
EPub support — hence the name EPubDog.

Emacspeak 35.0 is all about
teaching a new dog old tricks — and is aptly code-named HeadDog in
on of our new Press/Analyst contact. emacspeak-34.0 (AKA Bubbles)
established a new beach-head with respect to rapid task completion in
an eyes-free environment.

Emacspeak 30.0 AKA SocialDog brings the Social Web to the
audio desktop—you cant but be social if you speak!

Emacspeak 29.0—AKAAbleDog—is a testament to the resilliance and innovation
embodied by Open Source software—it would not exist without the
thriving Emacs community that continues to ensure that Emacs remains
one of the premier user environments despite perhaps also being one of
the oldest.

Emacspeak 28.0—AKA PuppyDog—exemplifies the rapid pace of
development evinced by Open Source software.

Emacspeak 27.0—AKA
FastDog—is the latest in a sequence of upgrades that make previous
releases obsolete and downgrades unnecessary.

Emacspeak 26—AKA
LeadDog—continues the tradition of introducing innovative access
solutions that are unfettered by the constraints inherent in
traditional adaptive technologies.

Emacspeak-11.0 –code named Aster– went the
final step in making Linux a zero-cost Internet access solution for
blind and visually impaired users.

Emacspeak-10.0 –(AKA
Emacspeak-2000) code named WonderDog– continued the tradition of
award-winning software releases designed to make eyes-free computing a
productive and pleasurable experience.

Emacspeak-9.0 –(AKA
Emacspeak 99) code named BlackLab– continued to innovate in the areas
of speech interaction and interactive accessibility.

Emacspeak-8.0 –(AKA Emacspeak-98++) code named BlackDog– was a major upgrade to
the speech output extension to Emacs.

Emacspeak-95 (code named Illinois) was released as OpenSource on
the Internet in May 1995 as the first complete speech interface
to UNIX workstations. The subsequent release, Emacspeak-96 (code
named Egypt) made available in May 1996 provided significant
enhancements to the interface. Emacspeak-97 (Tennessee) went
further in providing a true audio desktop. Emacspeak-98
integrated Internetworking into all aspects of the audio desktop
to provide the first fully interactive speech-enabled WebTop.

The Emacspeak mailing list is archived at Vassar –the home of the
Emacspeak mailing list– thanks to Greg Priest-Dorman, and provides a
valuable knowledge base for new users.

9 Press/Analyst Contact: Tilden Labrador

Going forward, Tilden acknowledges his exclusive monopoly on
setting the direction of the Emacspeak Audio Desktop, and
promises to exercise this freedom to innovate and her resulting
power responsibly (as before) in the interest of all dogs.

1 Investors Note:

With several prominent tweeters expanding coverage of#emacspeak, NASDOG: ESPK has now been consistently trading over
the social net at levels close to that once attained by DogCom
high-fliers—and as of May 2016 is trading at levels close to
that achieved by once better known stocks in the tech sector.

2 What Is It?

Emacspeak is a fully functional audio desktop that provides complete
eyes-free access to all major 32 and 64 bit operating environments. By
seamlessly blending live access to all aspects of the Internet such as
Web-surfing, blogging, social computing and electronic messaging into
the audio desktop, Emacspeak enables speech access to local and remote
information with a consistent and well-integrated user interface. A
rich suite of task-oriented tools provides efficient speech-enabled
access to the evolving service-oriented social Internet cloud.

4 Establishing Liberty, Equality And Freedom:

Never a toy system, Emacspeak is voluntarily bundled with all
major Linux distributions. Though designed to be modular,
distributors have freely chosen to bundle the fully integrated
system without any undue pressure—a documented success for
the integrated innovation embodied by Emacspeak. As the system
evolves, both upgrades and downgrades continue to be available at
the same zero-cost to all users. The integrity of the Emacspeak
codebase is ensured by the reliable and secure Linux platform
used to develop and distribute the software.

Extensive studies have shown that thanks to these features, users
consider Emacspeak to be absolutely priceless. Thanks to this
wide-spread user demand, the present version remains priceless
as ever—it is being made available at the same zero-cost as
previous releases.

At the same time, Emacspeak continues to innovate in the area of
eyes-free social interaction and carries forward the
well-established Open Source tradition of introducing user
interface features that eventually show up in luser environments.

On this theme, when once challenged by a proponent of a crash-prone
but well-marketed mousetrap with the assertion "Emacs is a system from
the 70's", the creator of Emacspeak evinced surprise at the unusual
candor manifest in the assertion that it would take popular
idiot-proven interfaces until the year 2070 to catch up to where the
Emacspeak audio desktop is today. Industry experts welcomed this
refreshing breath of Courage Certainty and Clarity (CCC) at a time
when users are reeling from the Fear Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD)
unleashed by complex software systems backed by even more convoluted
press releases.

5 Independent Test Results:

Independent test results have proven that unlike some modern (and
not so modern) software, Emacspeak can be safely uninstalled without
adversely affecting the continued performance of the computer. These
same tests also revealed that once uninstalled, the user stopped
functioning altogether. Speaking with Aster Labrador, the creator of
Emacspeak once pointed out that these results re-emphasize the
user-centric design of Emacspeak; "It is the user –and not the
computer– that stops functioning when Emacspeak is uninstalled!".

5.1 Note from Aster,Bubbles and Tilden:

UnDoctored Videos Inc. is looking for volunteers to star in a
video demonstrating such complete user failure.

6 Obtaining Emacspeak:

Emacspeak can be downloaded from GitHub –seehttps://github.com/tvraman/emacspeak you can visit Emacspeak on the
WWW at http://emacspeak.sf.net. You can subscribe to the emacspeak
mailing list — emacspeak@cs.vassar.edu — by sending mail to the
list request address emacspeak-request@cs.vassar.edu. The Emacspeak
Blog is a good source for news about recent enhancements and how to
use them.

The latest development snapshot of Emacspeak is always available via
Git from GitHub at Emacspeak GitHub .

7 History:

Emacspeak 44.0 continues the steady pace of innovation on the
audio desktop.

Emacspeak 43.0 brings even more end-user efficiency by leveraging the
ability to spatially place multiple audio streams to provide timely
auditory feedback.

Emacspeak 42.0 while moving to GitHub from Google Code continues to
innovate in the areas of auditory user interfaces and efficient,
light-weight Internet access.

Emacspeak 41.0 continues to improve
on the desire to provide not just equal, but superior access —
technology when correctly implemented can significantly enhance the
human ability.

Emacspeak 40.0 goes back to Web basics by enablingefficient access to large amounts of readable Web content.

Emacspeak 39.0 continues the Emacspeak tradition of increasing the breadth of
user tasks that are covered without introducing unnecessary
bloatware.

Emacspeak 38.0 is the latest in a series of award-winning
releases from Emacspeak Inc.

Emacspeak 37.0 continues the tradition of
delivering robust software as reflected by its code-name.

Emacspeak 36.0 enhances the audio desktop with many new tools including full
EPub support — hence the name EPubDog.

Emacspeak 35.0 is all about
teaching a new dog old tricks — and is aptly code-named HeadDog in
on of our new Press/Analyst contact. emacspeak-34.0 (AKA Bubbles)
established a new beach-head with respect to rapid task completion in
an eyes-free environment.

Emacspeak 30.0 AKA SocialDog brings the Social Web to the
audio desktop—you cant but be social if you speak!

Emacspeak 29.0—AKAAbleDog—is a testament to the resilliance and innovation
embodied by Open Source software—it would not exist without the
thriving Emacs community that continues to ensure that Emacs remains
one of the premier user environments despite perhaps also being one of
the oldest.

Emacspeak 28.0—AKA PuppyDog—exemplifies the rapid pace of
development evinced by Open Source software.

Emacspeak 27.0—AKA
FastDog—is the latest in a sequence of upgrades that make previous
releases obsolete and downgrades unnecessary.

Emacspeak 26—AKA
LeadDog—continues the tradition of introducing innovative access
solutions that are unfettered by the constraints inherent in
traditional adaptive technologies.

Emacspeak-11.0 –code named Aster– went the
final step in making Linux a zero-cost Internet access solution for
blind and visually impaired users.

Emacspeak-10.0 –(AKA
Emacspeak-2000) code named WonderDog– continued the tradition of
award-winning software releases designed to make eyes-free computing a
productive and pleasurable experience.

Emacspeak-9.0 –(AKA
Emacspeak 99) code named BlackLab– continued to innovate in the areas
of speech interaction and interactive accessibility.

Emacspeak-8.0 –(AKA Emacspeak-98++) code named BlackDog– was a major upgrade to
the speech output extension to Emacs.

Emacspeak-95 (code named Illinois) was released as OpenSource on
the Internet in May 1995 as the first complete speech interface
to UNIX workstations. The subsequent release, Emacspeak-96 (code
named Egypt) made available in May 1996 provided significant
enhancements to the interface. Emacspeak-97 (Tennessee) went
further in providing a true audio desktop. Emacspeak-98
integrated Internetworking into all aspects of the audio desktop
to provide the first fully interactive speech-enabled WebTop.

The Emacspeak mailing list is archived at Vassar –the home of the
Emacspeak mailing list– thanks to Greg Priest-Dorman, and provides a
valuable knowledge base for new users.

9 Press/Analyst Contact: Tilden Labrador

Going forward, Tilden acknowledges his exclusive monopoly on
setting the direction of the Emacspeak Audio Desktop, and
promises to exercise this freedom to innovate and her resulting
power responsibly (as before) in the interest of all dogs.

Thursday, February 25, 2016

Augmented Headphone Listening On Linux For The Emacspeak Audio Desktop

1 Executive Summary

A combination of ALSA, Ladspa and OpenAL can provide an enhanced
headphone listening experience on Linux — this article summarizes
various tools and techniques for leveraging these affordances on the
Emacspeak Audio Desktop.

2 Glossary

ALSA

Advanced Linux Sound Architecture. This is my prefered
means of controlling audio, and I entirely avoid Pulseaudio on
all my machines.

Ladspa

Linux Audio Developer's Simple Plugin API. Enables
the injection of Digital Signal Processing (DSP) when playing
media. It is a layer that sits above ALSA. Ladspa filters
can be used by user-space applications like MPlayer and
SoX when playing media. They can also be used within the
user's ASoundRC to define virtual audio devices that inject
DSP plugins into the media stream.

OpenAL

OpenAL is an API for enabling cross-platform 3D
audio. User-space applications like MPlayer can use OpenAL as
the audio output driver — note that OpenAL on Linux writes to
ALSA under the covers.

3 Playing Media Using MPlayer

With Ladspa and its associated plugins installed — at the minimum
I would recommend installing tap-plugins, moduleemacspeak-m-player provides a number of affordances for
interactively applying Ladspa filters. See commandsemacspeak-m-player-apply-reverb-preset_(bound to _P in M-Player)
and command emacspeak-m-player-add-filter (bound to f inM-Player).

Command emacspeak-m-player-apply-reverb-preset lets you pick
among a total of 42 reverb presets defined by Ladspa module tap_reverb.

Command emacspeak-m-player-add-filter lets you add some of the
more commonly used Ladspa effects with smart minibuffer
prompts. Use tab completion to discover some of the predefined
filters — these are just convenience shortcuts — and you can
add any filters you use commonly to this list.

Note that mplayer also has its own
HRTF filter, but that filter requires that the stream being played is
a 48K stream.

Command emacspeak-m-player-using-openal bound by default toHyper ; launches mplayer with OpenAL as the audio output
driver — adding the following line

4 Defining Virtual Audio Devices For Use With Soundscapes

I use soundscapes to provide a pleasant auditory background as I work
— see earlier blog article that describes Soundscapes On The
Emacspeak Audio Desktop. Defining virtual ALSA devices that inject
Ladspa plugins into the output processing chain is an elegant means
for enhancing the auditory experience provided by these
soundscapes. In this instance, I apply one of the predefined reverb
effects (Ambiance) from Ladspa module tap-plugins and pass the
results through a BS2B (Bauer Stereo To Binaural) filter — see filescapes/ladspa-asoundrc in the emacspeak Github Repo. Notice that that
file defines a number of virtual audio devices and can serve as a
template for injecting any installed Ladspa plugins — you can first
experiment with filters using Emacspeak's Laudible module to find
settings that work for you before applying them via a virtual device
defined in your asoundrc file. Finally, you can customize optionsoundscape-manager-options to add –device <devicename> to have
the soundscapes use the desired virtual device.

5 Summary

Laptops today have plenty of processing power and some really nice
audio hardware. Linux has a powerful audio processing stack in ALSA,
Ladspa and OpenAL. Connecting the dots can be fun and provide an
enhanced auditory environment.